HARP 5-1 Canadian earth atmosphere probe. Launched from 1960. The HARP 5-1 gun probe was a dart-shaped, sub-caliber vehicle with a major diameter of 66 mm, a length of 116 cm and a flight weight of 10.4 kg. More...

HARP 5-3 Canadian earth atmosphere satellite. Study 1960. The HARP 5-3 probe was developed during HARP to reduce the complexity of the 5 inch vehicles and in particular the nose eject system used by the HARP 5-1 probe. More...

HARP 7-1 Canadian earth atmosphere suborbital probe. Flights from 1961. The original HARP 7-1 gun probe was fundamentally a scaled up version of the 5-1 gun probe and was used for similar payloads. More...

HARP 7-2 Canadian earth atmosphere probe. Study 1961. The Harp 7-2 vehicle was an optimized version of the 7-1 vehicle. The 7-2 had a body diameter of 76 mm a length of 1410 mm a flight weight of 18.2 kg and a payload volume of 2048 cc. More...

Martlet Canadian gun-launched orbital launch vehicle. In 1962-1967 Canada's Gerard Bull led development of the Martlet system for gun-launched access to space. The program was cancelled before the objective of gun launch to orbit was attained. More...

Martlet 2 Canadian sounding rocket. The Martlet 2 series were the primary 16" gun-launched sub-orbital flight vehicles used during the High Altitude Research Program (HARP). Martlet 2's were used to conduct extensive research at altitudes of up to 180 km with some 200 flights being conducted between 1963 and 1967. The very low cost per flight, about $3,000, made it ideal for a wide variety of applications.. Typical mission payloads included chemical ejection to produce an observable atmospheric trail and assorted sensors with multi-channel telemetry. More...

Martlet 1 Canadian sounding rocket. The Martlet One Flight Vehicle was designed in mid-1962 as a first generation test vehicle for the HARP project. The primary role of the Martlet One was to test the fundamental technologies that were to be used in the Martlet Two vehicle. These included the internal ballistics of the 16" L45 smooth-bored gun system, the pusher plate/ laminated plywood sabot system and the ability to receive radio telemetry from a gun launched vehicle in flight. More...

Martlet 3B Canadian sounding rocket. Once the fundamental design flaws of the Martlet 3A vehicle were identified the system was redesigned and a new vehicle, the Martlet 3B, was created.

The Martlet 3B vehicle was similar in design to the 3A vehicle but sported several design changes intended to improve the system performance. The first major change was to replace the aluminium airframe with a alloy steel airframe in the hopes the stronger material would lead to higher mass fractions. Other improvements included the use of a larger diameter rocket motor (increasing the outer diameter to 8 inches / 20 cm) and the use of six fixed fins instead of the 3A's four fins. More...

Martlet 3A Canadian sounding rocket. The Martlet 3A was the first serious attempt to produce a sub-calibre, gun-launched, rocket-assisted, vehicle for the 16 inch gun system. The basic design criteria for the Martlet 3A was to gun launch a vehicle containing a rocket motor that could provide a velocity boost equal to or greater then the initial gun-launch velocity.

The theoretical performance of the Martlet 3A was for an 18 kg payload to be carried to an altitude of some 500 km at gun-launch accelerations of 12-14,000 g's and gun launch velocities in the range of 2100 m/sec (similar to the Martlet 2 series maximum launch parameters). More...

Martlet 4 Canadian gun-launched orbital launch vehicle. The Martlet 4 was ultimate goal of the HARP program - a gun-launched orbital launch vehicle. Two versions were considered: a preliminary version with two solid propellant upper stages, and a later model with two liquid propellant upper stages. Payload of the liquid propellant version would have reached 90 kg. The initial version was in an advanced stage of suborbital flight test when the HARP program was cancelled in 1967. More...

7 inch HARP Gun Canadian gun-launched sounding rocket. The highly successful 5 inch HARP gun had demonstrated the immense versatility of small portable gun systems for atmospheric exploration. The 7 inch HARP gun system represented the 5 inch system scaled up to the largest barrel size practical, while still remaining portable. More...

GLO-1B Canadian gun-launched orbital launch vehicle. When compared to the early Martlet 4 designs the GLO-1B was a considerably more sophisticated vehicle with many of the shortcomings of it's predecessor having been addressed. Not long after the original HARP project ended the major assets of the project were acquired by the projects management, Dr. Gerald Bull in particular. The HARP Program became the Space Research Corporation (SRC) with the intention of resurrecting the HARP orbital program. Over the years a much improved and considerably more sophisticated Martlet 4 was developed and given the name of GLO-1B. More...

Martlet 2G-1 Canadian gun-launched orbital launch vehicle. The Martlet 2G-1 was the absolute minimum gun-launched satellite vehicle. Conceived when the HARP project was under threat, it was a seven-inch diameter, two-stage solid propellnat vehicle that would be sabot-launched from the HARP 16 inch gun. Its total payload in orbit would have been just two kilogrammes - ideal for today's planned nano-satellites. Unfortunately even this minimum orbital launch vehicle could not be demonstrated before the program was shut down. More...

Martlet 2G Canadian sounding rocket. This derivative of the Martlet 2 gun-fired suborbital space probe achieved a higher scientific payload through use of a lighter sabot. 12 were flown before the program was ended. More...

5 inch HARP Gun Canadian gun-launched sounding rocket. When most people think of the HARP Program they usually think of the big 16 inch guns roaring skywards as they launch test probes into the upper atmosphere. What most people do not realise was that even before HARP small portable gun launchers were used for the same purpose and even during HARP hundreds of high altitude flights were conducted using small guns. The 5 inch gun-launch system was initially designed to satisfy the requirements of the Meteorological Rocket Network This required that an 0.9 kg (2 lb) payload be carried to an altitude of 65 km (40 miles). Typical payloads were radar reflective chaff ejected at apogee, which was tracked by radar to yield wind data, and small Metsondes which drifted to earth under large parachutes and returned radio telemetry of temperature, humidity and the like. More...

Babylon Gun From March of 1988 until the invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Iraq contracted with Gerard Bull to build three superguns: two full sized 'Project Babylon' 1000 mm guns and one 'Baby Babylon' 350 mm prototype. Nine tonnes of special supergun propellant could fire a 600 kg projectile over a range of 1,000 kilometres, or a 2,000 kg rocket-assisted projectile. The 2,000 kg projectile would place a net payload of about 200 kg into orbit at a cost of $ 600 per kg. The 1000 mm guns were never completed. After the war UN teams destroyed the guns and gun components in Iraqi possession. More...

Tamouz Iraqi space launch vehicle/ICBM based on clustering of Scud tactical missiles. Canadian rocket scientist Gerald Bull was allegedly killed by Israeli agents not for his work on the supergun, but rather for his much more damaging assistance to the Iraqis in doing the dynamic calculations for the Tamouz. More...

Martlet 3D Canadian sounding rocket. The Martlet 3D concept was intended to serve as a sub-orbital vehicle capable of lifting heavy payloads to satellite altitudes. The Martlet 3D was simply the first stage of the Martlet 4 vehicle ( Martlet 4A) with the two upper stages and the satellite payload being replaced with a single large payload. More...

Martlet 3E Canadian sounding rocket. The Martlet 3E vehicle was designed to take advantage of the portability of the HARP 7 inch guns. Unlike the big fixed 16 inch guns the 7 inch HARP guns, were portable and could be relocated to conduct launches from a wide variety of sites. It was soon determined that a gun-launched rocket vehicle for the 7 inch gun would have a similar performance to the Martlet 2 glide probe launched from the fixed 16 inch guns. Launch costs would also be about the same. More...